Shelter
by whatifellinlovewith
Summary: "Because it's only now, with Kelly Nieman emerging from shadow to person to nightmare, that her brain pauses in its betrayal, manages to remind her of something, the most important thing, despite the narcotics controlling it. It's only then that she remembers the baby." A 7x15, Reckoning, AU. For Rach.


**Shelter**

* * *

 _For Rach (aka rippedateveryedge, check out her fic) on her birthday._

* * *

She wakes to a dark room, to sterility and invisible walls and the beam of light glowing beneath the door. Banded around her stomach, around her ankles and wrists, caught in the restraints of the fabric around her body, of the drugs still blurring, darkening the edges of every thought.

And she wants to scream; she feels the breath welling within her, making her chest quake and ache, but there's a piece of fabric, awful and thick, in her mouth. It forces her to suck in a breath through her nose, to feel the burn of unspoken words in her throat when she finally exhales.

When she finally blinks away some of the fog still swirling in her mind, fighting the poison still coursing through her veins.

She might not be able to think, might be imprisoned in this room, bound to this board like it's some semblance of an operating table, but she knows something's wrong.

Everything's wrong.

But it's only when the door opens, the beam of light turning to a flood, a halo around a shadow. Her gaze locks on the pop of a hip, the lean arms, the barely visible gleam of red. It sends her heart racing, battering itself against the cage of her ribs, as restraining as the bands of black fabric wrapped around her.

The scream well in her chest once again, her toes curling against air, her hands gripping at the edges of the table until her fingertips ache against the pressure.

Because it's only now, with Kelly Nieman emerging from shadow to person to nightmare, that her brain pauses in its betrayal, manages to remind her of something, the most important thing, despite the narcotics controlling it.

It's only then that she remembers the baby.

* * *

The earth shifts beneath her, or around her, with the press of a single button. She's moving, tilting, flying until she's face to face with the woman who's haunted her nightmares for over a year, who's staring at her with the same hunger in her eyes that a predator has for its prey.

The gag is gone, wrapped around her neck instead, but the threat as tangible, as real as the darkness that falls over the room. A grid shines down on her, tracing the angles of her face from her hairline to her neck, the light bright in her eyes until she turns away, her gaze drifting to Nieman.

A story she doesn't want to hear is tumbling from her lips, a tale that confirms everything she's feared, everything that's had her waking up in the middle of the night. It confirms how dire the situation is, how the bands around her wrists are holding her here, trapping her and forcing her to await her death.

It's a confirmation of loyalty between one killer and another, as deep founded as the love between her and Castle, but endless in its threat. A loyalty, an invisible bond she must break.

To save her own life. To save her child.

Her voice comes out raspy, burning her throat, her mouth as she returns the threat, reminds Nieman of how the psychopathic brain works, as though she doesn't already have enough intimate knowledge.

It's vile, it's in vain, the threat of death and the offer to help. It has Nieman smiling rather then relenting, reaching for something her mind isn't quick enough to catch up on.

And then her captor is telling of plans for an escape, of plans for freedom, and she's trapped, caught by bands of black fabric and threat of a death she can't risk.

Her face is staring back at her, right alongside Nieman's, though. Her own reflection drives her to desperation, to begging, thrashing her head against the board beneath her, her eyes stinging, her throat burning with every echo of her request.

 _Please._

The earth tilts again, drawing her back down this time, as black fabric is drawn from around her neck and returned to her mouth, silencing her futile pleas.

* * *

Her fingertips are bleeding, the metal, the fabric, the thread cutting through her skin as she unscrews the bolt, as she plucks at the seams holding the restraints in place. Her eyes are locked on the screens, as Nieman virtually steals her face, revealing layers of muscle and bone, and puts it on her own picture.

She can't see it, but she can imagine the satisfaction spreading across her captor's face. It only drives her more, has her ignoring the pain in her fingers and plucking at the threads, desperation forcing her to act despite the pain.

The phone rings, loud in the silence. It draws her gaze back up, has panic seeping into her chest, into her bones and muscles as she listens. She only hears one side, but it's no mystery who's on the other side, no secret how much danger she's in, how much danger her baby's in.

And then Nieman hangs up the call, a vicious smile on her face. She rolls out a bag of tools, of weapons, on the table, the promise of pain bright in her eyes.

"It'll all be over soon," she says. "But I've so enjoyed our time together."

She writhes on the table, still caught, still trapped, as Nieman reaches over, reaches for her. She traces her cheeks with the pad of her thumb, lets her fingertips drift over her lips and down her arms, tripping over the band of fabric still wrapped around her wrists.

A hand, pale even in the bright room, lifts from the smooth surface of the table, releases the bony protrusions of her wrist to press against her stomach instead, against the thick wrap of fabric holding her in place.

"I wish I could take your baby, too," says Nieman. "You would like that, wouldn't you? If I could let your child survive even though you die." Her hand presses down harder. "I know it's not the life you imagined for your little guy…or girl, but it's something, right? It would be more of a life than he or she will actually have."

And then she's gone, a shadow lost behind the door, leaving her lying on the table, the thread finally breaking beneath her fingers.

She hasn't cried this whole time, but now the tears well.

* * *

She kills Nieman.

Without hesitation, without giving herself a second to feel the stuttering of her heart or the ache in her lungs or the sinking in her stomach. She manages to slip free of the restraints, ignoring Nieman's grip on her wrist as she slices through the straps of fabric holding her in place.

Nieman lunges, and she dodges the hit, the hand reaching for the scalpel held tightly in her fingers.

And next thing she knows she's standing in one corner of the room, staring at the floor, blood coating her hands, tainting the air, staining the tiled floor where it leaks from Neiman's side. She's impossibly pale, her face snow white and draped with dark red strands of hair, her neck wrapped in a thick layer of black fabric.

She's staring down at a dying woman. She killed Kelly Nieman.

She wants to drop the scalpel, to celebrate or break down, she isn't sure. Both seem to well within her, joy swirling in her mind, guilt heavy in her chest. Her grip on the knife tightens, and her other hand hangs at her side, fingertips just barely brushing against the outside of her thigh.

It's just enough to remind her she's alive, that she should be celebrating, that she survived this death trap and being targeted by a couple of serial killers. That her face isn't being stitched onto someone else's. That her baby is still safe inside her.

That she came out of this with nothing but blood on her hands.

Her hand twitches, staining the black fabric of her pants red. Her eyes fall closed only to open wide again. She wants to flatten her palm over her stomach, over the life that almost faded along with her, but she can't bring herself to stain something so innocent with the evidence of such violence.

She killed Kelly Nieman, and the blood is drying on her hands, dripping from the scalpel to the floor, keeping her fingers stuck together. All she can do is stare at the wall in front of her.

Until there's a click from behind her, and stillness, awe that fills the room. There's a step, the sound echoing off the walls, slowing her racing heart, alleviating the weight on her shoulders, the pressure against her ribs.

" _Kate._ "

It's a breath, a question, curious and worshipping all at once. It has her sucking in a slow breath, keeps it from burning this time. The scalpel falls to the ground, lands in the puddle of blood at her feet.

And she turns around.

Relief wells in her stomach at the sight of him, her husband, overwhelming in its intensity. He reaches for her, his hand hesitant and careful, gentle as he cradles her cheek in his palm and draws her towards him. Her cheek touches his, the touch as feather light as the fabric of his jacket against her chin.

More comforting than anything she's ever known.

And against his neck, she whispers the only thing she can think to say.

"The baby."

* * *

His hands are strong, bracketing her arms when he leads her home, his side pressed against hers, the warmth of his touch, the reverence in his gaze driving every step she takes. He leads her through the living room, through their bedroom until she's standing in the middle of the ensuite, his lips dusting a promise to her temple.

"Ready to wash this day away?" he whispers.

All she can do is nod.

He's careful. His hands splay over her shoulders, over the dips of her spine, his lips brushing against the back of her neck as he draws the sweatshirt down her arms. It falls to her feet without a sound, and her arms lift to let him tug her shirt over her head.

She shoves her own pants down, stepping out of the puddle of fabric at her feet when his palm lands on her stomach, caresses the tiny life within her. His touch is gentle, warm and loving, like nothing she's ever felt, when he leads her into the shower. He shields her from the initial burst of cold water, his arms banded around her middle, his lips dusting promises against her temple.

"I had to do it," she whispers, the words lost in the patter of water against the glass "I couldn't let her kill me. I couldn't let her…kill the baby."

He squeezes her middle, his chest pressed hard against her back. "I know, Kate." It's a whisper, warm against the shell of her ear, loving in the warmth of his embrace. "I know."

Another kiss , to her neck this time, and he's gone, the warmth of her husband replaced by the beating of water against her back, down the dip of her spine. Her head falls back into the warmth as Castle's hands splay wide across her sides, tracing the ridges, the ladder of her ribs.

"I'm so proud of you," he says, the reverence in his voice echoed in the caress of his hand over her belly. "You might not see it, Kate. Not yet at least, but you did exactly what you had to do to save yourself, to save our baby. And I'm so proud of you for it. I'm…amazed by how strong you are."

Her vision blurs, fogs, and a single drop that hits the shower floor is unlike the others. The next one is wiped away with the pad of his thumb before it can fall.

And he catches her before she can fall with it.

* * *

It reminds her too much of her PTSD, the haunted feeling the follows from the shower to bed. The voices at the edges of every memory, of every second. The darkness that hides her peripheral vision when he turns off the water and drapes a towel over her shoulders.

One arm finds the space beneath her knees, the other banding strong around her back, and she's floating, drifting, pressed tight against his chest. Her head lolls against his shoulder.

Her eyes are still wide open, burning with it. Her fingers curl weakly around the fabric of the towel, an anchor too heavy for her to hold.

And then she's sinking with it, his arms slipping from around her as her head lands on a pillow that smells like her husband, that smells like home. Her eyes fall closed, the voices fading, the darkness dissipating.

But all she sees in that strand of red hair, stained not with dye, but with blood.

They snap open again, into his blue ones. Wide with panic while his are wide with fear. With worry, not for himself, but for her. With selflessness beyond anything she's ever known.

"Kate?" he breathes.

The reverence hasn't faded. The worry simply blends with it, seamless in the single syllable of her name.

"Every time I close my eyes, I see her face," she whispers, the explanation cracked, broken, too real. "I remember that I killed her, with just my hands and a tiny knife, Castle, and I can't…"

He swipes wet hair from her face, the strands caught on her fluttering lashes, wrapped around her neck like the band of black fabric was earlier. "Can't what?"

There's a lump in her throat, in her chest, suffocating her like hands around her neck, like that band of fabric, the gag holding her back as much as the pin of grey eyes. She whimpers around it, blinks against the burn of tears in her eyes, the sting of emotional that's always unwelcome.

"You keep saying I saved our baby, but I killed someone to do it. I killed her with my bare hands, Castle, and I can't touch my belly…I can't taint out baby with that before they're even born."

" _Kate_."

He leans over her, presses a kiss to her forehead. It feels like awe, and the one he dusts to her knuckles is reverence, and the one he brushes to her stomach is love, for her and for the baby safe inside her.

"I don't know how you did it," he whispers, his breath warm against the bare skin of stomach. "For two days, I didn't know where you were and I just about went crazy. I don't know how you held it together for the eight weeks I was missing."

She didn't, and the words to tell him as much are caught in her throat. But there's no words to explain that she went crazy, that she imagined him bringing her coffee, that she dreamed of the wedding they didn't get to have.

"You don't have to tell me," he continues, his hand coming up to snag hers. "I just want you to know how strong you are. How extraordinary you are, Kate, in my eyes. And how our baby, no matter what happened today, will see you the exact same way."

"But I–"

He kisses her stomach, right below the curtain of her ribs. "You did what you had to do." He seals the words with another press of his lips to her skin. "You saved yourself, you saved our baby, and you saved everyone that Kelly Nieman would have killed had she escaped. You were amazing today, Kate. And you don't have to believe it, because our baby and I will believe it for all us okay?"

She nods, slow and dizzying, finally letting go of the towel because she almost believes him.

Almost believe the promise he breathes against her skin over her over again, painting the promise against her belly.

* * *

He helps her get dressed, pulling a plum purple shirt that both hides and matches the bruises around her wrists, supporting her when she steps into a pair of pants that hangs loose around her aching thighs. His arm wraps around her shoulders, drawing her against him, and he leads her from the bedroom.

She finds herself on the couch, wrapped in a heavy woolen blanket, his lips lingering against the crown of her head. He squeezes her shoulder, doesn't say a word as he walks away.

He makes her a milkshake that tastes suspiciously like the ones she loves from Remy's, but she doesn't bother asking as he takes up the spot next to her.

He's caring, gentle, letting her rest her head on his shoulder before reaching for her. His hand settles on her belly, over the thick layer of wool, where hers has yet to touch.

"The milkshake okay?" he asks, like he knows solids were not a possibility.

Her stomach is sensitive with hormones, shaken from trauma.

She nods. "Yeah," she mumbles, the word caught in her straw. "It's great. Thank you."

He kisses her again, on the high ridge of her cheekbone, his thumb tracing a line against her middle, back and forth, lulling her to calm, distracting her from the voices inside her head, stealing her from the image of her face on Nieman's body. Drawing her to him, to the man who thinks she extraordinary, who loves her no matter what happens.

She's there when he calls his daughter and his mother, whispering promises of safety, promises of this Tyson thing being _over_ , for good this time. He sings her praises, his eyes locked on hers as she cradles the glass in her palms, stares at the swirl of pink around her straw.

He sings her praises because she killed a woman.

Because she saved herself and her baby.

The cup falls to the couch, leaning against the back cushion and the armrest. Her hand falls, too, catching his, her fingers curling around his palm. The palm on her stomach, over her baby, over the life she saved, both lives she saved.

And it's scary. She can still feel the restraints around her wrists, around her ankles, around her neck, can still see the strand of red hair draped across a white tiled floor, the blood staining it, staining everything.

She still sees it.

But she can still see the future she saw last week, the one she used to see when she closed her eyes, when he looked at her like he's looking at her now.

She can still see it all, a blinding flash of good and evil, of love and hate overpowered by the warmth of her skin, of his hand over hers, of their family wrapped in the warm woolen blanket, spread across many miles, and yet together all the same.

The family she saved.

* * *

He leads her to the bedroom, his hand caught in hers, his eyes alight with love like she's never seen in them before. And she follows willingly, through the silence of the apartment, through the darkness that seems so much brighter than any surgical light she's ever stared into.

His fingers tighten around hers before his grip goes limp, his hand slipping from her grasp as he promises that he'll be right back and steps towards the bathroom. He doesn't bother turning on the light, the bedroom is already bright enough.

She swallows against the urge to follow him, against the agonizing space between them and crawls into bed instead, over the covers. The fabric of her shirt hides the bruises on her arms, the evidence of this day that feels like it will never end, that feels eternal.

He comes out of the bathroom, his eyes locked on her, the reverence she saw earlier only amplified, only brighter. His hand drifts across the foot of the bed, over her bare feet as he walks around in only to crawl onto his side, the mattress dipping beneath his weight.

"Tired?" he breathes, and this time the words don't get lost, aren't muffled by the voices she wishes she couldn't hear.

She nods as he reaches over, his fingers brushing over her arm, from her shoulder to her fingers and back up again, like he knows what it does for her, like he knows it keeps her with him.

Like he knows it can draw the truth from her, leave her spilling it into the silence.

"Every time I close my eyes, I see her face," she whispers, to him, away from him, because he never saw the evil in Nieman's eyes, the spark of energy in them when her fingers wrapped around that scalpel. He didn't see pale skin go white as blood drained onto the tiles.

But he understands.

"I see his, too. Since that night on the bridge."

And she knows it's true. Tyson has been his ghost for years, has haunted him in the darkness of night just as Bracken haunts her, just as Nieman will, too.

It has her rolling onto her back, her gaze meeting his, finding love rather than pain, rather than the fear she knows still darkens hers.

"You know how I deal with it?"

She shakes her head, whispers her answer into the space between them. "No."

His smile is sweet and loving yet ever so slight as he reaches for her, his fingers catching hers, drawing her hand to the gap between them, the space on the bed, over the covers.

"I open my eyes and look at you," he says, so very genuine, so very him that she can't argue, can't fight the draw of his eyes, the promise of his embrace.

He presses a kiss to her lips, his hand drifting across her stomach, the promise of the life yet to come caught between her skin and his, whispered from his mouth to hers, as true as the vows they spoke that day in November.

And she settles into his arms, sinking into the promise of their future together, into the warmth she wants to spend the rest of her life in.

Into the love she hopes he feels in her arms, too.

* * *

 **"Home is a shelter from storms—all kinds of storms." -William Bennet**

* * *

 _Rach, I hope this piece of Reckoning fic featuring a crazy serial killer was satisfactory and that you have a fabulous day to start off a great year, and, well, if not...at least your day is better than Beckett's? Happy birthday! xx -Callie_

 _And, as always, a huge thank you goes to Lindsey for beta'ing this for me._


End file.
